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Show Reprinted from The Colorado Quarterly Volume XX, No. 2, Autumn 1971 The perfect hi-fi Upon a time once long ago, long back even before there was such a thing as stereo and everything was therefore mono, there lived a young couple named Bill and Joan, ordinary people with a very ordinary desire not to be ordinary. But it was terribly difficult. Bill worked downtown in the usual kind of office, for he was an accountant, a good one but not that much better than average, and he had no desire to behave monstrously, either as a devil or a saint, so there he was. But he was a pleasant young man and not a blank either: he had played bass in his high school orchestra and still liked music, he attentively tried to appreciate art, and he read a book now and then. A cultured young man. Joan had married him while she was still in college. She went on for a degree in political science and then found she couldn't do much with it except teach, and the children appalled her, so she found a job downtown, too, in a bookstore. It paid badly, but since it was in a minor key interesting, she felt lucky to get it. She liked music too, and art museums, and read constantly. Also, she had pretty grey eyes and clear white skin and the nicest ash blonde hair swept across her forehead. In the bookstore her steady gaze distracted some of the most intellectual of men. She and Bill enjoyed being married, enjoyed meeting after work and going home to their small clever apartment and cooking together. On Fridays they ate downtown and saw a movie, which Joan enjoyed more than Bill, and on Saturday nights they partied with their friends, which Bill enjoyed more than Joan. He drank a bit too much and told off-color jokes, got a glow of lust in his eyes and flirted with the other young wives, charming them with the same talents which had helped win Joan but which she felt should be buried now that they had served their purpose. So in the ordinary course of things she urged him to get a hobby and felt considerably safer when he started to build a hi-fi. hi.fi 167 SLyt. t° |